Super XIII

[Walter sobchak]

The professional future of French RL lies in the English league structure and needs to be concentrated around the heavily populated regions in southern France like we already have in Toulouse and I would even argue with the likes of Lyon, Marseille and maybe a Bordeaux or Montpelier etc.

 

[miguel de cervantes]

to be fair, they had to go hard and promise something ridiculous to some degree to attract investors, so can't complain about that too much.

 

[yakstorm]

So did I read right in this article (https://treizemondial.fr/luc-dayan-livre-les-raisons-de-lechec-du-super-xiii/), the FFRXIII went to French RU and asked if they could use their Professional players?

Absolute madness if I'm reading it right. Even if there was no history between RU and RL in France, no Pro sport in the world is going to free up their players to play another game for the benefit of that other sport.

Its one thing to target RU players to try and build the squads, but surely they never thought the FRU would go for the concept?

Unfortunately in the short-medium term the best course of action for France is to get more clubs into the British system. Potentially if numbers get to a point, then the French clubs can break away as a conference or separate league, but at the moment there isn't the monies to turn enough existing clubs Professional and definitely not enough to lure Catalans or Toulouse back, who are both stronger clubs now than when they were only in Elite One.

 

[miguel de cervantes]

hmmm...french union leaders in the past have stated that league would be an ideal training exercise for union, so there may have been an angle there. it may also have been seen as a way to get media coverage, a foot in the door.

again, I wouldn't diss it too much - we see this sort of thing in south africa for example at some level.